Books for Electrical Engineering (1 Viewer)

[freespace]

To Students currently doing Engineering:

What books are required, and what do you recommend, for electrical engineering and engineering in general?

Want to know now so I can get them early or get them 2nd hand.

Thanks in advance!
Steve

 

[ErgoSum]

Hey...
This year i did software engineering which has same first year as Electrical Engineering. Note book editions might change between years, this wont really effect you although sometimes lectures will put up a note saying this lecture covers pages 20-25 say. But if you look through the book u can find the info pretty easily neway.
Also dont hold me responsible if they change the text book this year (might happen)


Books for math subjects: None, the uni publishes little course work books which are like 10 bucks each, aparently there is a calculas book that is recommended for people who didnt do 3u math or ppl who want to go into greater depth in a subject
For stats you need to get a textbook, but this is published by the lecturer so they may change it or somethign.

Books for Elec1101, and elec1102. For elec 1101 you need
Tocci and Widmer, Digital Systems - Principles and Applications, 8th Edition, Prentice Hall
for Elec1102. Dorf and Svobode, Introduction to Electric Circuits, 4th Edition, Wiley
I like digital systems, its a pretty good book. Introduction to electric circuits can be confusing though..

Physics(both of them)- You need Young & Freedman. University Physics. 10th edition- Getting the right edition for physics is probably a good idea, cos the lecturers put up lists of practice questions and recomended chapters to read. Also you have fortnightly "homework assignments" consisting of like 4 questions of which 2 are marked, and the questions are often specific textbook questions.

Software- The recommended textbook is big java. In reality you can buy any book on java 1.1 or above. Big Java is a good introduction to programming though, since its standardised id go for that if you feel the need for a book on java. You could also just download thinking in java by bruce eckel for free... but since software exams are open book, its nice to have a good api reference in dead tree form.

I think thats it, personally i waited until second week of uni to buy all my text books cos then you find out exactly what you need. But you can probably get em cheaper if you buy them now second hand.. check out the second hand bookshop (in the cubby house in wentworth)... im not sure if its open during the holidays but thats definately the place to go.

Ah yeah, more information can be grabbed here..
http://www.ee.usyd.edu.au/ugrad/Degree_Info/ee_res.phtml

 

[freespace]

Thanks for the advice ErgoSum.

BTW, is Java part of the engineering course? I am a c/perl person, and has been for the last 4 years, OO doesn't float my boat very well (another debate for another time).

Thanks again for your wisdom,
Steve

 

[ErgoSum]

Java

Yeah, java is the language for soft 1001/1901, and 1002/1902 well it was this year and i doubt they will change it. I think its because sydney uni has no prereqs or assumed knowledge for engineering, so they start off with a managed language that people will hopefully be able to pick up. The idea is (as usual) to teach the concepts and stuff without people having to worry about low level things. So if you do engo at sydney you will have to learn java, otoh .. at least java is a pretty useful language to know as well as being platform neutral.

 

[ErgoSum]

OO vs other types

And object oriented has its place, its pretty good for group development work (which is what first year software focuses on, which sucks!!). First year software at usyd is nothing special.. hopefully second year will be better (although the title of the software course for first semester "Software development methods" has me doubting ... still its good stuff if you want a job in the industry.

 

[freespace]

Got a friend who is will be doing software engineering.

I feel sorry for him But then he DOES write code @ 100USD per hour, he probably end up teaching

As for OO, *sigh* I'll try VERY hard not to do any software courses... OO is horrid in my opinion Java is nice for its sandbox and garbage collection... as long as I can get away using as little OO as possible. C++... lets just say it has been descripted as an octopus made by nailing 4 more legs to a dog...

If I have to do OO, I will survive... hopefully

 

[stag_j]

i'm doing electrical engineering. but i still do soft 1001. does this mean i have to learn java?